Tara LaRosa (21-2) has long been considered among the best female fighters on the planet.

Yet the former BodogFIGHT champion has struggled to remain active in recent years as promoter promises failed to materialize time and time again.

LaRosa admits it’s been a frustrating journey, but she’s excited her path has now led to this weekend’s Invicta Fighting Championships event. For the 34-year-old LaRosa, the all-female promotion may finally provide her a chance to work back to the top of the rankings.

“I’m super excited,” LaRosa told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “Hopefully it puts me back in the rankings. I’m hoping to pull this one out.”

LaRosa meets fellow 125-pounder Vanessa Porto (14-5) at Invicta FC 3, which takes place Saturday at Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kan., and streams on the promotion’s official website. It’s LaRosa’s second fight of 2012 after competing just once in 2011. She’s currently 18-1 in her past 19 fights with the lone loss coming via split decision to Roxanne Modafferi.

But she’s struggled to find consistent work over the past few years, and her career has endured several speed bumps along the way. LaRosa admits it’s been a frustrating process.

“When you get all worked up for a fight and you get excited and one’s coming up – even if you decide to take one on short notice – and you get back in the gym, and you start going at it hard, and you put all of your mental, your thoughts and everything and physical into it, and then all of a sudden it’s not there, it’s like, ‘S—, now what? Now what am I going to do? Maybe there’s something else,'” LaRosa said. “And then nothing else comes along. After this happens two or three times in a row within like a two-month period, you get a little discouraged, and you start to lose your momentum, and you get really kind of disgusted. It’s like, ‘Why am I busting my ass so hard? Why am I training so hard when nothing is coming?’ Nothing is going through, and it just feels like people are jerking you around.

“And when you’ve been in the sport as long as you have, you think you’d learn to roll with it, but I don’t know. I think just the opposite. You’d think that things would even out after a while. You’d think that you have a couple months to prepare for a fight. You go through an entire training camp, you get to the fight and you’d have it. But that still doesn’t seem to be what’s going on.”

But LaRosa believes that may now be changing. Invicta FC has already put on two well-received events, and the promotion’s third event is loaded with top female talent. The promotion has been widely praised for its professionalism and operational savvy, and LaRosa is excited about the prospects of what lies ahead.

“This is great,” LaRosa said. “With Invicta, I’ve had two months to get ready – even longer. I know who I’m fighting. There hasn’t been any kind of switches or anything.

“This is a dream. This is really, really a great opportunity. I’m really loving what Invicta does.”

A highly decorated grappler, LaRosa boasts 12 of her 21 victories via submission. In Porto, she faces a similar foe who has earned 10 of her 14 career wins via tapout. It’s a challenge LaRosa welcomes.

“It’s going to be tough,” LaRosa admitted. “Oh, my God. This girl is good at what I do. It’s kind of like fighting myself.”

The promotion hasn’t announced what implications the LaRosa vs. Porto bout has in relation to future plans, but the veteran fighter quickly points out that another 125-pound bout of Aisling Daly vs. Barb Honchak also takes place at Invicta FC 3, and she wouldn’t mind seeing a four-woman playoff for the company’s first 125-pound title.

“They’ve got my fight at 125, and then there’s also another terrific fight at 125 in Aisling Daly and Barb Honchak,” LaRosa said with a smile. “So what does that mean for the future? You think they might be looking at making a 125-pound title? I don’t know.”

Saturday may prove to be a crossroads for LaRosa. A victory could very will springboard her back to the top of the rankings, while a loss might show what the missed opportunities actually cost her. LaRosa certainly hopes it’s the former, and she believes her career may finally again be on an upswing.

“I took about a year and some off because things were just slow,” LaRosa said. “I could not get a fight. Everything kept falling through. It was a mess. … But things are starting to come around, and things are starting to look up at 125 now. We’ll see.”

MMAjunkie.com Radio broadcasts Monday-Friday at noon ET (9 a.m. PT) live from Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino’s Race & Sports Book. The show is hosted by “Gorgeous” George Garcia, MMAjunkie.com lead staff reporter John Morgan and producer Brian “Goze” Garcia. For more information or to download past episodes, go to www.mmajunkie.com/radio.

Ronda Rousey’s statistical greatness has already ventured into uncharted territory – just six fights into her UFC career. Check out all the post-fight facts, including Rousey’s latest achievements, about UFC 190.

UFC champion Ronda Rousey did it again when she smashed Bethe Correia in 34 seconds at UFC 190. But after her third straight opponent tries and fails to make it out of the first minute, the world’s best female fighter needs a better dance partner.